New Member with "Final 500" Aurora

[dlcunionmo]

Was cruising around web and discovered this Aurora owners' site and joined. I have a 03 "Final 500" Aurora that I bought new in April of 2003. I love this car!

Am interested in any information on "Baby Northstar" engine. Performance, reliability history, etc.

The only problem I have had with this car is a bad intermediate steering shaft that has been on back order for two months now. Anyone else have this problem?? Am told that this is a GM wide problem for other models as well.

[JimW]

You'd be the 3rd Final 500 owner!

Welcome, what number is your 500? Become familair with Rocketman and Skexius our other 2 Final 500 owners.

I believe you can find information on the intermediate shaft problem in the 2nd Generation Mech and Maintanance forums.

[stevensolds]

welcome dude! do you use yours as a daily beater? there is one around here Jim as well if i havent mentioned before. Got a few dinged up panels, dent the size of a golf ball in the rear bumper. Pretty sad. I will get a pic the next time i can. If anyone sees me i will drive off very fast

[erw38]

Welcome, nice to have you with us.

[skexius]

A grand HELLO to you dlcunionmo and Welcome to the BEST Aurora board around!!

I am Skexius, as JimW mentioned above and own a Final 500 also that I specially ordered and bought new in April/May 2003. My car is #55 of the 500. I have every option available on it except the Navigation Radio and the Engine Blocker Heater (wanted the heater too, but my dumb dealer didn't order it for me). I currently have 539 miles on mine. I don't drive it much and keep it stored in a storage unit. I thoroughly love this car!

There is a quick synopsis about my car. Tell us more about your car, adventures buying it, and how you are enjoying it thus far. Inquiring minds want to know! ;D

skexius

[Letitroll98]

Welcome dlcunionmo! I think you'll find all you want on this board. The best Aurora site by far, growing exponentially, yet still a family feeling. Lots of support and help, with the occational spat that is quickly forgiven. Congrats on the Final 500, post some pics on "My Aurora".

[dlcunionmo]

Thanks everyone for the welcome. Let me try and answer everyones' questions and tell you a little more about myself and #167.

I have the 167th Final 500, according to the plaque they sent me after the purchase. Does anyone else have a plaque with their Final 500? I do use the car as the "daily beater" but live and work outside the main metropolitan area of St. Louis and only drive about 20 miles roundtrip to work every day so it doesn't get too much wear and tear since I only have about 22K miles on it. I have liked Auroras since they originally came out and always wanted one. A friend has a 2002 with the V-6 and I liked the styling of the 2nd generation as well. I rode in his and decided "I gotta have one of these" some day. In April, 2003 when my other Olds blew another head gasket, (what's up with those 3.8L V-6's??), I made the leap and bought one. Wasn't planning on buying a Final 500 but when I saw them at the dealers I went ahead and signed on the dotted line. Mine has all the bells and whistles including the Bose sound system with CD and cassette deck. The only things it doesn't have are the navigation system and engine block heater, don't really need or want the navigation system and since the winters are not that bad here in St. Louis probably don't need the engine heater either. This time of year though the electric seat warmers definitely spoil you.

After buying the car I kind of decided that if I had to do it all over again I would have rather had a lighter color Final 500 rather than the dark cherry color of the Final 500. I realize the Final 500 only came in the dark cherry. It gets dirty too fast!!

The car handles very well and the V-8 really gets up and goes without realizing it. The other evening on the interstate, to get around and put a pack of speeding semis behind me, I opened it up and found myself doing 110+ before I realized it. The engine just purrs along there are no vibrations or loud road noises. Definitely nicer than a friend of mine's Lexus 400!

Another thing...as I was perusing what members do as far as changing the oil. I change mine myself using 5w30 Castrol GTX oil with the PF-61 AC/Delco oil filter. After break in I have been changing oil about every 3500-4500 miles or 55-60% on the "Oil Life" indicator. The indicator is now about 55% with almost 4700 miles so I am waiting for a warm weekend as the oil and filter are waiting in the garage.

Hope this find everyone well and look forward to hearing from other members.

dlcunion aka Don

[kobalt]

Welcome aboard dlcunionmo, post some pictures of your final 500

[JimW]

Don, you and the other 500 owners should put in their Personalized Text the number of the Final 500 that they own. That would be cool to keep track of who has what.

Check the profile link above and add it to Personalized text, hopefully Rocketman and Skexius will follow suit!

[skexius]

dlcunionmo,

Dark cars of any color do tend to get dirty quick. Just the nature of the beast I guess. I think that the Dark Cherry is a pretty and unusual color among the sea of other more common colors available today.

Yes, I have the Collector's Appreciation package that all Final 500 owners were mailed after buying one. The very nice framed and numbered color picture of the Aurora was included. That was a major nice bonus item from the factory to get for buying the car that is very rare to get today.

You should invite your friend that has the 2002 V6 to join us here on the board. All Aurora owners are welcome here.

The Aurora V8 is pretty fast. It may not be as fast as all the new 300+ horsepower V8s coming out now in the lower level luxury 4-doors, but it is one of the first FWD versions below Cadillac to have a V8 as STANDARD. It is one of the first to bring back the era of the V8 almost a decade before everyone else!! Truly special.

Enjoy your Final 500 and go easy when you can. There aren't any more left you know. ;D

skexius

[rocketman]

Welcome cousin 2 (skexius is 1st cousin)! He helped me find mine after posting a thread that I was looking for one (not on this site though).

I have #451 that you will see in some older threads I bought used with 4,xxx miles this summer. It is my back-up/collector car, having driven it about 2,000 miles since July. It has not seen the road in weeks because of the winter.

I agree with you on the color. It's a real b*t*h to keep nice. Note my older one is cappuccino which I think actually looks better to me. My wife calls mine the purple people eater - just jealous.

Both cars have had the intermediate steering shaft issue. I'm interested in how you got your dealer to order a replacement since my dealer refused on my cars. Get used to it fellow!

Good luck and visit often!

If you are nice to Aurora40, he will give you the link to his webpage where the performance numbers are charted. I visited it today at work (can I say that), but don't have the link bookmarked.

[w3rk5]

Hi dlcunionmo and welcome. It's kewl to know you drive it everyday (no pun intended skexius ).

[Mr. Javi]

Welcome aboard dlcunionmo,

You gotta love them Aurora Final 500.





[glow=red,2,300]Javi.[/glow]

[Aurora40]

dlcunionmo said:

Am interested in any information on "Baby Northstar" engine. Performance, reliability history, etc.

You can find some info on what went into the redesigned engine on this release from GM. The engine part applies to the Aurora: media.gm.com/division/cadillac/products/00cadillac/seville/00press.html

Welcome!

[Superdemon]

Welcome to the forum. Now we just have to get the other 497 final 500 owners on here and we will be set.



Mike

[scottydl]

Apocalypse said:

Welcome to the forum. Now we just have to get the other 497 final 500 owners on here and we will be set.

You beat me to it, I was thinking that JUST before I got to your post! ;D Welcome to the club dl! Do you live on the Missouri or Illinois side of the Mississippi River? There are a decent amount of Illinoisians here, and at least one or two in your area as well.

[bufo]

dlcunionmo said:

I have the 167th Final 500, according to the plaque they sent me after the purchase.
dlcunion aka Don

Other than the plaque, is there another way to tell which number your Final 500 is? Any correlation to the VIN? It'll be interesting to compare your VIN to another Final 500 VIN.

[auroralover]

Bufo,
do you realize your are replying to 9 month old threads?

[bufo]

auroralover said:

Bufo,
do you realize your are replying to 9 month old threads?

Yeah.
I'm a n00b who's necro-posting ;D
And why start a new thread when there's a perfectly usable existing one? This thread's got tread!

[oldsauroraman1]

Good name for it!

[skexius]

bufo said:

dlcunionmo said:

I have the 167th Final 500, according to the plaque they sent me after the purchase.
dlcunion aka Don

Other than the plaque, is there another way to tell which number your Final 500 is? Any correlation to the VIN? It'll be interesting to compare your VIN to another Final 500 VIN.

I can shed some light on this subject. When I was buying my Final 500, I looked at the virtual stickers of many Final 500s on GM's Buypower and the Oldsmobile websites at different dealers all around the country. I found that all the Final 500s had this pattern to the last 8 digits of their VIN numbers:

341nxxxx (where 3 = 2003 model year), (4 = made at Orion, MI plant), (1 = starting number for this plant's sequence production order in 2003), (n = 7 or 8), and (x = last 4 unique numbers for that car)

The last five numbers are ascending upwards. I actually have the VINs of several Final 500s that I collected from eBay and other car sites. The #33 Final 500 had a VIN like 341749xx (cannot remember the last two numbers). I have the #55 Final 500 with a number a little higher than this. Rocketman (one of the other Final 500 owners on this board) has the #467 car and has a VIN like 3418xxxx. So all Final 500s were made between 341748xx and 3418xxxx.

This is the only educated way that I have been able to figure out if a 2003 Aurora is a Final 500 or not. It won't tell you what number it is out of 500, but you can make a ballpark guessimate based on the VIN sequence.

Hope this helps!

skexius

[bufo]

skexius said:

I can shed some light on this subject . . .

skexius

As they say on TV: "BRILLIANT!" Thank you for the info--it was very helpful. Too bad the VINs are not sequential, but I guess the Orion plant was building more than one model

[Aurora40]

skexius said:

bufo said:

Other than the plaque, is there another way to tell which number your Final 500 is? Any correlation to the VIN? It'll be interesting to compare your VIN to another Final 500 VIN.

I can shed some light on this subject. When I was buying my Final 500, I looked at the virtual stickers of many Final 500s on GM's Buypower and the Oldsmobile websites at different dealers all around the country. I found that all the Final 500s had this pattern to the last 8 digits of their VIN numbers:

341nxxxx (where 3 = 2003 model year), (4 = made at Orion, MI plant), (1 = starting number for this plant's sequence production order in 2003), (n = 7 or 8), and (x = last 4 unique numbers for that car)

The last five numbers are ascending upwards. I actually have the VINs of several Final 500s that I collected from eBay and other car sites. The #33 Final 500 had a VIN like 341749xx (cannot remember the last two numbers). I have the #55 Final 500 with a number a little higher than this. Rocketman (one of the other Final 500 owners on this board) has the #467 car and has a VIN like 3418xxxx. So all Final 500s were made between 341748xx and 3418xxxx.

This is the only educated way that I have been able to figure out if a 2003 Aurora is a Final 500 or not. It won't tell you what number it is out of 500, but you can make a ballpark guessimate based on the VIN sequence.

Hope this helps!

skexius

They should be in order. They were supposed to be the last 500 Auroras made, thus they'd have the last 500 VIN numbers. If you know your VIN and what number it is, I *think* you should be able to determine all the VIN's of the cars.

[oldsauroraman1]

Yes, that should be the way it is, uh, should be!

[skexius]

aurora40 said:

skexius said:

I can shed some light on this subject. When I was buying my Final 500, I looked at the virtual stickers of many Final 500s on GM's Buypower and the Oldsmobile websites at different dealers all around the country. I found that all the Final 500s had this pattern to the last 8 digits of their VIN numbers:

341nxxxx (where 3 = 2003 model year), (4 = made at Orion, MI plant), (1 = starting number for this plant's sequence production order in 2003), (n = 7 or 8), and (x = last 4 unique numbers for that car)

The last five numbers are ascending upwards. I actually have the VINs of several Final 500s that I collected from eBay and other car sites. The #33 Final 500 had a VIN like 341749xx (cannot remember the last two numbers). I have the #55 Final 500 with a number a little higher than this. Rocketman (one of the other Final 500 owners on this board) has the #467 car and has a VIN like 3418xxxx. So all Final 500s were made between 341748xx and 3418xxxx.

This is the only educated way that I have been able to figure out if a 2003 Aurora is a Final 500 or not. It won't tell you what number it is out of 500, but you can make a ballpark guessimate based on the VIN sequence.

Hope this helps!

skexius

They should be in order. They were supposed to be the last 500 Auroras made, thus they'd have the last 500 VIN numbers. If you know your VIN and what number it is, I *think* you should be able to determine all the VIN's of the cars.

Aurora40,

I don't think that you quite understand how they numbered the Final 500 Auroras. The VIN numbers are not sequential because they also made Bonnevilles, Lesabres, and Park Avenues at the plant at the same time during that model year. They made all the Final 500s from March 10th through March 28th. They DID NOT stop production of the other cars for those three weeks and concentrate on building just 500 Auroras one after another in one big batch. They kept building all the cars at the same time down one line, but during those three weeks, all the Auroras that were built were Final 500s. They would only build a certain number of them each work day, but build them in amongst all the other cars. So, naturally the VINs would not be sequential, but would be steadily increasing in amongst the other cars.

EXAMPLE:
1.) You would have one Bonneville coming down the line

2.) Next in line would be an Aurora Final 500

3.) Next down the line would be a Park Avenue

4.) Next coming down the line would be another Bonneville

5.) Next coming down the line might be a Lesabre

6.) Next down the line mght be another Final 500 Aurora

7.) Next down the line might be a Park Avenue

8.) Next down the line might be another Lesabre

9.) Next down the line might be another Bonneville

10.) Next down the line might be a Final 500 Aurora

So, you see the pattern. They are being made in a random fashion without regards to building in batches. However, when all the Auroras were produced, they were indeed the last 500 Auroras that were built on the line. They were numbered #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, etc. out of 500 as they came down the line during those three weeks.

I hope that this makes sense to you and clears up any confusion.

skexius

[Aurora40]

They share VINs with the Bonneville and LeSabre?

[skexius]

aurora40 said:

They share VINs with the Bonneville and LeSabre?

Yes,

the parts of the VINs that relate to what plant it was built at, the year it was built, and the VIN sequence numbers for this plant's production. The other parts of the VIN that relate to the particular car itself is, obviously, different and unique.

skexius